The present invention relates to the improvement of a golf club, namely the putter, which is used on the green, or putting surface surrounding the hole, for the purpose of rolling the ball to the hole. The invention is particularly useful in the fringe or longer grass areas surrounding the putting surface of the green. However, it is also useful on the putting surface, away from the fringe or longer grass areas.
There are many instances when a golf ball that is hit onto the green will roll across the putting surface and will come to rest against, or in, the fringe or the longer grass area surrounding the green. With the ball in such a location, the use of the putter to achieve the desired control of direction and speed in rolling the ball to the hole becomes questionable due to the design of presently available putters. The typical design of such putters tends to position the blade or striking surface at ground level and, therefore, if the ball which has come to rest against or in the longer grass, is addressed in the same manner as if it were positioned entirely on the putting surface, the blade or striking surface is then positioned down in the densest or heaviest part of the grass. In trying to hit the ball with the blade in such a position, the grass will deflect the blade and the ball, as well as restrict or slow the movement of the blade towards the ball. Therefore, in addition to hitting the ball harder to try to avoid or reduce the effects of the grass on the ball and the putter blade, the blade must be raised and held at a higher point of contact on the ball which, not being a normal putting stance, is an unsteady position from which to initiate the putting stroke. Unless the golfer has considerable experience in the execution of such a stroke, the results are undesirable.
It has been known to construct a golf club head so as to cause a struck ball to hug the ground closely, due to the effects of over-spin. Such a club is taught in U.S. Pat. No. 2,472,312 in which a striking surface is positioned above the vertical center of the golf ball. Such a configuration ensures that the ball is "topped" and over-spin results.
It is an object of this invention to provide a putter which can be used in the longer grass areas surrounding the green without altering the basic putting stroke as would be used on the putting surface of the green. The basic putting stroke in this case being to move the putterhead away from and back into the ball, on as shallow an arc as possible, with the striking surface of the blade making square contact with ball.
It is an additional object of this invention to provide a single golf club head so configured that it can be utilized as both a right-handed and left-handed club head. It is yet another object of this invention to provide a golf club head which lends itself to weight modification and balance adjustment by the user.